The Syntax Of Conversation In Interlanguage Development

This book deals with the questions asked about the L2 acquisition process within different research paradigms, examines the results found in each approach, and evaluates the contributions of each to our understanding of L2 acquisition of syntax and to possible implications for L2 instruction.

Understanding how people learn and fail to learn second and foreign languages is increasingly recognised as a critical social and psycholinguistic issue. Second languages are vitally important to diverse groups of people, ranging from refugees to college students facing foreign language requirements. This book provides a synthesis of empirical findings on second and foreign language learning by children and adults, emphasising the design and execution of appropriate research.

The present volume provides a cross-linguistic perspective on the development of tense-aspect in L2 acquisition. Data-based studies included in this volume deal with the analysis of a wide range of target languages: Chinese, English, Italian, French, Japanese, and Spanish. Theoretical frameworks used to evaluate the nature of the empirical evidence range from generative grammar to functional-typological linguistics. Several studies focus on the development of past tense markers, but other issues such as the acquisition of a future marker are also addressed. An introductory chapter outlines some theoretical and methodological issues that serves as relevant preliminary reading for most of the chapters included in this volume. Additionally, a preliminary chapter offers a substantive review of first language acquisition of tense-aspect morphology. The analysis of the various languages included in this volume significantly advances our understanding of this phenomenon, and will serve as an important basis for future research.

The Handbook of Second Language Acquisition presents an integrated discussion of key, and sometimes controversial, issues in second language acquisition research. Discusses the biological and cognitive underpinnings of SLA, mechanisms, processes, and constraints on SLA, the level of ultimate attainment, research methods, and the status of SLA as a cognitive science. Includes contributions from twenty-seven of the world's leading scholars. Provides an invaluable resource for all students and scholars of human cognition, including those in linguistics, psychology, applied linguistics, ESL, foreign languages, and cognitive science.

Twenty years after its first publication, Susan M. Gass’s Input, Interaction, and the Second Language Learner has become a classical text in the field of second language acquisition (SLA). This new printing includes the original text, along with a new preface that comprises individual consultations between the author and Alison Mackey, Rod Ellis, and Mike Long on the importance of the project two decades later. The volume provides an important view of the relationship between input, interaction, and SLA. In so doing, it should prove useful to those whose major concern is with the acquisition of a second or foreign language, as well as those who are primarily interested in these issues from a pedagogical perspective. The book does not explicate or advocate a particular teaching methodology, but does attempt to lay out some of the underpinnings of what is involved in interaction—what interaction is and what purpose it serves. Research in SLA is concerned with the knowledge that second language learners do and do not acquire, and how that knowledge comes about. This book ties these issues together from three perspectives: the input/interaction framework, information-processing, and learnability. This Routledge Linguistics Classic remains a key text for all SLA scholars and an essential supplementary volume for students on SLA courses.

This book offers an in-depth explanation of Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) and the methods necessary to implement it in the language classroom successfully. Combines a survey of theory and research in instructed second language acquisition (ISLA) with insights from language teaching and the philosophy of education Details best practice for TBLT programs, including discussion of learner needs and means analysis; syllabus design; materials writing; choice of methodological principles and pedagogic procedures; criterion-referenced, task-based performance assessment; and program evaluation Written by an esteemed scholar of second language acquisition with over 30 years of research and classroom experience Considers diffusion of innovation in education and the potential impact of TBLT on foreign and second language learning

This collection in honor of creolist Charlene Junko Sato (1951–1996) brings together contributions by leading specialists in pidgin-creole studies in three primary areas: Pidgin-Creole Genesis and Development; Attitudes and Education, and Creole Discourse and Literature. The varieties covered come from English, French and Spanish lexical bases and from places as far apart as Africa, Australia, Hawaii, and the Caribbean. Editors Rickford and Romaine introduce each of the papers and provide a biography and bibliography of Sato. A short story and poems in Hawaiian Creole, Sato’s native language and the variety which was the focus of her research and writing, round out the collection.